We moved on to the stairwell. Normally I wouldn’t trust stairwells, even those in the sides, because someone can always be there, two floors up or one floor down, and they can hear every word you say. But it seemed there was no one there and it was better than the even more public hallway. I walked to the railing. I leaned up against it before sitting on it. I fidgeted and looked around. She looked to me expectantly. I looked away. I looked up at the bottom of the stairs above me “I don’t know how to…but really there’s a simple way…but I don’t want to…and I don’t know…” I rambled and continued to clasp my hands in different positions. “And maybe…” “Why don’t you just say it?” She said gently, like that wasn’t obviously what I was struggling with. “I…” I paused and pointed to myself, as though she may be confused on whom I was really referring to “I don’t….I….like girls.” There I said it. “What? Oh.” She didn’t say it in a mean way. It was a tone of comprehension. I looked at her, expectant and scared. “That’s it? I thought it was something horrible!” “What, like a terminal illness?” “Yeah. No, that’s fine, don’t be silly.” That wasn’t actually what she said, but it was something like it. I can’t remember the specific words because I was not judged. I was not avoided, or scorned. I was not treated differently because of it, and I had someone to talk to about it when there was no one else. Because there was no one else.